Yo!
Ed here, reporting in from the toilet of the observatory
deck in top left quadrant of the middle section of the principal ship of The
Extinction Fleet. I’ll be taking this opportunity to share some of my thoughts
and opinions on my experience this semester.
At the start of the semester, The Fleet took turns pitching
ideas to each other, and then we all voted on which idea to move forward with
in the class. I was extremely excited when my idea won the voting session, but
I knew full well that being project manager and “creative director” wouldn't be
easy. People don’t like being nagged, and they like being told what to do even
less. Triple that when the people in question are your friends. As excited as I was to be working with good friends who I
knew had the skills to see the idea though, I was borderline dreading having to
be a sort of boss. But I knew that sometimes I would have to put on that hat,
in order to get things done and to meet our goals.
Since the very beginning of my game idea, I was thinking of
ways to incorporate everyone’s input and to make it feel like our game, as opposed to my game. I tried my best, but being a
perfectionist with mild OCD, sometimes it didn't work out so well. I remember
obsessing over the angle of the spike on our main robot’s head for several
minutes, and it only took five of those several minutes to get the artists of
The Fleet very annoyed. Don’t get me wrong, that spike had to be DAMN right in
order to fully portray the sexiness of such a perfect mechanical creation, but
it was something that could have been worked out over time, instead of having
to perfectly nail it before moving on to more important matters.
Another challenge was the relationship with our programmer.
I knew I wanted him on the team well before the start of our class, for his programming
skills and his “take matters into your own hands” attitude. But due to our evil
school credits, he was not able to get into the class! That created all sorts
of issues. One, as our professor warned us, someone who is not in the class
might not be as driven to complete their tasks and drive things forward, since
they are not worried about their grade. Two, being external and not attending
UB any longer, he was not able to join us during lab time. And three, having a
demanding job that also required programming, he was not as available to work
on our game as much as we would have liked. All these issues came together to
create long wait times in order to see our game, and some disappointments when
it was time to present during milestones. He tried his absolute hardest,
though, and The Fleet is thankful for all the work he put into the game.
Despite the asteroids and turbulence in our journey so far,
it has been well worth it. It feels amazing to work together with other
individuals you trust and see a creation of your own slowly and steadily come
into fruition. The greatest reward though, hands down, was the rest of The
Fleet telling me they appreciate what I did this semester. After our
disagreements, duels, evil eyes, silent treatments, lightsaber battles,
gladiator matches, decapitations, and rib pokes, it was good to know my team
members were glad to have me on board. Three highly-talented individuals are
trusting me to do my part to get this project done, and I don’t plan on failing
them.
That’s all for now, citizens. You may leave me to my bowel
movements now.
Long
Live
The Fleet
Live
The Fleet
Edwin Guerrero (Narrative Designer, Project Manager)
